Very creative and it looks to be well made. It looks like something you could market and sell. Thanks for sharing.

http://www.roguepanda.com/

I have seen the Sierra Designs Arrow Rock 30 Degree Sleeping Bag online from $149 - $199. It's just under 2.5 pounds and with a bit of effort I can fit it in an XS sea to summit event compression sack.

Here are two very thorough reviews i read before I grabbed one for $149 on moosejaw.

http://www.backpackgeartest.org/reviews/Sleep%20Gear/Sleeping%20Bags/Sierra%20Designs%20Arrow%20Rock%20Bag/Test%20Report%20by%20Michael%20Wheiler/

http://www.backpackgeartest.org/reviews/Sleep%20Gear/Sleeping%20Bags/Sierra%20Designs%20Arrow%20Rock%20Bag/Test%20Report%20by%20Ralph%20Ditton/

I plan on augmenting it with a liner, a full layer of merino [tops, bottoms, mittens, socks, hat] and perhaps a bivy. I have owned a number of Sierra Designs products in the past and this factored into my purchase. My goto tent for years was a sierra designs clip cd. I bought it in 1997 and it is still serviceable.

I am still looking at bags and may upgrade before my next tour.

Great advice... I added a link from my site your site...lots of good stuff there. Thanks for the suggestions.

I have an outdoor products dry bag that is a bit smaller and managed to fit everything in it. Looking at the photos you can see that the bottom of the harness is only two inches above the tire. The frame size and stack height of the stem basically dictate that I cannot change the clearance. I will wrap the bag in some type of shell and run a front fender to protect my gear. Unless there are any other suggestions.

First off thanks! That was a brilliant effort. I will post some pics this weekend of some of the things I am trying.

MTNbound in this instance I am only talking about the harness. 1 large waterproof bag or 3 smaller waterproof bags in the harness.

Is there an advantage to one big bag or several smaller bags when placed in the harness.

I am running a suspension fork but I ride it locked out most of the time. It's an old '94 fork and has at most 1 inch of travel. I'm more of a bicycle tourist than an off roader; however, my next tour will see a good deal of fire roads. I was considering a fender to help prevent rubbing a hole through my dry bag.

Currently I have everything in one drybag that is stuffed into a large dry bag. Is there any benefit to having things staggered or stacked separately and not in the one dry bag?

I have tried several configurations and will continue trying.

I am experimenting with my Revelate harness packing things up and looking at how things fit. I am wondering what the minimum tire clearance between my dry bag and my front tire should be. I have about 2 inches right now with a fairly large load and that looks tight to me.

How much clearance do you have and what is not enough?

I am riding a 26er with a suspension fork...you have some nice bags though. Thanks for the link!

Thanks for the tip Bob. I have never used a bottle mount there and I appreciate that you share the experience and I don't have to learn the hard way.

I have no braze-ons whatsoever down there...but thanks for sharing. It would be better to keep water lower and I am certain that I can come up with a way to create a mount point for a cage that will work. I appreciate the links and photos. Thanks!

I am running a carbon suspension fork, a full frame bag, a set of home made feedbags, and a viscacha seat bag. I would like an option to carry additional water.

I'm not clamping anything on the carbon fork. My seatbag and frame bag are full. My feedbags will carry two bottles and I can have a 2 liter bottle bag in the framebag.

Have a look at the photo I have attached. It would be pretty easy to fabricate a wider version of this that would be attached to the saddle rails and would not interfere with the seatbag. The bottles would face to the side instead of to the back on this version. These would be empty most of the time but would be an option when I needed extra water.

Any thoughts?

I am a tourer not so much a bikepacker. I am in the process of switching to bikepacking bags.

3 cross country tours with hotel once a week.

First tour with a buddy: 55 lbs [newbie who brought way too much stuff]

Second tour with a buddy: 25 lbs [really dialed down]

Third tour solo: 30 lbs camped almost every night.

I would think my next tour will be even lighter. When I finish a tour I clean all of my equipment and box it up. Each time I repack for a new tour I tend to find a lot of things that I look at and say 'Why did I ever think I would need this?'. I have also purchased a lot of higher end gear as my interest in touring has increased. I want to be lighter each time I go out.

Regardless of how I spread the weight around the first day or so on a tour has a learning curve. The first big climb and descent are treated with the utmost respect. I think about this until the bike, gear, and effective handling become second nature.

The same is true when I find a place where i will shed the bags for a couple days and ride around 'naked'. The bike instantly handles different and before I start ripping around I take a moment to run through some 'drills' to get a feel for the bike and it's new found handling.

Your pack girdle inspiring...thanks for sharing.

Can you estimate the total weight you are carrying in the bag and the total weight you are carrying in the girdle?

Kudos on the idea and build quality. This looks to be a great addition to a seat bag.

I sent you a PM with some links. I would love to be involved.

Not a soloplex a hexamid solo - http://www.zpacks.com/shelter/hexamid.shtml

I went all in with the extended beak, net flooring, cuben fiber bathtub groundcloth, carbon fiber pole, and 8 titanium stakes. I am really excited to test it out. It's the smallest and lightest shelter I have ever owned. Just over a pound and compresses much smaller than the 6" x 12" stuff sack it comes in. Fully taped and looks to be very high quality gear.

Again I will have a full write up with video and photos to link to in about two weeks. I am very excited to test this shelter. I have no association with zpacks outside of marveling at gear on their site. All in it set me back $475 USD. Expensive but considering the price of a hotel in the US it should pay for itself after 5 nights.

I was planning on using a Eureka Backcountry 1 but the prospect of dropping 3.5 pounds and cutting my pack size was too much to pass up.

I will be testing a zpacks tent from Jun 28 - July 8. I will pen up a lengthy review and post up a link.